The one human being she had ever fully and wholeheartedly trusted had failed her; the only man she had ever known to whom she could point and say with expert knowledge, “He is a gentleman, in his heart he is a gentleman,” had betrayed her, publicly, grossly, and shamelessly. (81)

For this year’s Siblings’ Book Club, I’ve challenged my siblings to a collective read of ten classic books, or at least ten books we’ve always wanted but have never taken the time to read. From a list of over thirty titles submitted by everyone, we voted on and selected our top ten to read throughout the year. Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman was far and away the top pick, for while we’d all grown up with the Pulitzer Prize-winning To Kill a Mockingbird, none of us had even heard of this book. At least, not until one brother wisely put it up for consideration.

As we read at our own paces throughout January, we discussed the novel periodically—avoiding spoilers—and gleaned a number of insights that would have otherwise passed without notice. We of course discussed prejudice and racism, as well as Lee’s wit, before delving into the main theme of conscience, but perhaps my greatest personal takeaway was the example of Lee’s patience and genius as an author. I’ll attack each of these four issues in turn.

Not surprisingly, Watchman is shaded with the same racial overtones as Mockingbird, as it follows many of the same characters in the same county, only this time a number of years down the road. Jean Louise—now the twenty-something woman—once again narrates this story from the depths of her soul. On a return from her job in New York City, Jean-Louis finds herself back in a Maycomb County locked in time, and yet changing in ways she had never anticipated.

Her brother is dead, and Atticus is now living with his sister, whose prejudice is made clear early on, as she responds to Jean-Louise’s hint that she might marry Henry, her father’s protégé at the law firm. “Henry is not and never will be suitable for you,” she says. “We Finches do not marry the children of rednecked white trash, which is exactly what Henry’s parents were when they were born and were all their lives.” (28) Even Atticus later attempts to justify Maycomb’s racist mindset, telling his daughter: “So far in my experience, white is white and black’s black. So far, I’ve not yet heard an argument that has convinced me otherwise. I’m seventy-two years old, but I’m still open to suggestion” (176) and then, “Honey, you do not seem to understand that the Negroes down here are still in their childhood as a people.” (177)

These statements are hard even to read, certainly, but their coarseness are what makes this book so poignant. My siblings and I all grew up (super) white in Wisconsin, but also schooled in the South. While racism likely existed in the Midwest in the late ’80s, we had no idea how terribly white-America still bared its ugly, racist teeth until we arrived in the Deep South where the “N” word was common parlance among “middle class whites” and a very obvious rift between the blacks and whites still existed, like a festering wound on the face of the region. Even today, my brother who lives in North Carolina can sense the deep-seated belief among many whites that the confederacy still exists, at least in the heart, and that the South truly will one day rise again to continue its legacy of segregation. Such concepts are so foreign to me, yet having also followed the BLM events over the past few years, I know that this historical background is necessary for us to understand even the headlines of today.

Lee’s novel isn’t as dark and depressing as its subject matter, and she plays well with the humor of life, employing it as a refreshing contrast against her heavy plot. The first real kick that got me laughing was Jean-Louis’s coy response to her aunt’s bigotry: “Aunty,” she said, cordially, “why don’t you go pee in your hat?” (29) Later in Chapter 5—perhaps the most well-rounded and enjoyable chapter of a novel I’ve read in a long time—Atticus even chimed in with his straight-laced, no guff sense of humor:

“Mary Webster was on the blower. Her advance agents saw Hank and me swimming in the middle of the river last night with no clothes on.”
“H’rm,” said Atticus. He touched his glasses. “I hope you weren’t doing the backstroke.”
“Atticus!” said Alexandra. (61)

And then, of course, there’s uncle Jack, a real God-like figure, a surprise character who’s a sensitive listener and yet also a man who has all of the answers. After literally smacking his niece clear and violently in the face for talking against her father, he looks at a bottle of whiskey and relieves the tension of the scene (and truly the entire book) by saying, “Well now, I think I’ll just go and have myself a drink on that. I never struck a woman before in my life. Think I’ll go strike your aunt and see what happens.” (186) My sister said she laughed out loud at this line, and I can understand why—a masterful tension-release by Harper Lee.

The main theme of the book is that of conscience, the thing we expect to have earned from our parents but is really something gifted to us by Someone much greater. Jean-Louise finds herself in a struggle (as the introductory line to this post suggests) when she learns that her father—the champion of the wrongly-accused negro—is actually sympathetic to the white supremacists in his midst! Harper Lee truly took her sweet time to bring her audience to this revelation (part of her genius, discussed shortly), and thus it’s the patience of the reader who loves these characters that allows for the great pay-off. Truly the tagline that encapsulates everything is this advice from the girl’s God-figure, Uncle Jack: “Every man’s island, Jean Louise, every man’s watchman, is his conscience. There is no such thing as a collective conscious.” (188) But there are also a number of other moments in the books where the theme is developed more subtly. For example, Jean-Louis learns that:

If a man says to you, “This is the truth,” and you believe him, and you discover what he says is not the truth, you are disappointed and you make sure you will not be caught out by him again. But a man who has lived by truth—and you have believed in what he has lived—he does not leave you merely wary when he fails you, he leaves you with nothing. I think that is why I’m nearly out of my mind…. (127)

Later, when she finds out that Henry as well as Atticus leans toward the segragationist attitude, the following discussion ensues:

“Henry, how can you live with yourself?”
“It’s comparatively easy. Sometimes I just don’t vote my convictions, that’s all.”
“Hank, we are poles apart. I don’t know much but I know one thing. I know I can’t live with you. I cannot live with a hypocrite.”
A dry, pleasant voice behind her said, “I don’t know why you can’t. Hypocrites have just as much right to live in this world as anybody.” She turned around and stared at her father. (168)

Ultimately, after Jean-Louise loses all faith in her father, but then begins to realize that her disagreement with him in this area doesn’t fully destroy her relationship with him in others, Uncle Jack again pipes in with this essential thought of the entire book: “We wondered, sometimes, when your conscience and his would part company, and over what.” Dr. Finch smiled. “Well, we know now.” (189)

The masterful delivery by Harper Lee of this essential line (delivered so long ago) came through such strict patience and foresight that truly, it can be described as her very genius. Unless one had read the literary reviews (or Wikipedia posts) about her two publications, one would have thought that Harper Lee first wrote and published To Kill a Mockingbird, only to later follow it by Go Set a Watchman. It would only make sense, right? But in fact, she had written this idol-killing novel about Atticus’ dark secret nearly a decade before she penned his idol-building epic, Mockingbird. What genius!

Had Harper Lee published her first novel Watchman first, the world would have had no concept of “the real Atticus Finch”, the Gregory-Peck version of the ideal father. Instead, we would have been introduced to a hypocrite, a human, a run-of-the-mill white supremacist in the early days of NAACP, and we would have ignored his character and, thus, his creator as well. Harper Lee would have been a forgotten author among so many would-be artists. But no, this genius author had patience! Rather than publishing this first work first, she instead waited, and eventually she wrote the backstory—a Pulitzer-Prize-winning piece—of the American Hero, Atticus Finch, as seen through the eyes of his pre-teen daughter. Only through this powerful, ground-breaking set-up of a heroic white lawyer defending a falsely-accused negro could Harper Lee create enough sympathy to boost the effectiveness of her original plot, the deconstruction of that very hero.

I honestly don’t think that there’s a lesson that other authors can learn from Harper Lee’s pre-planned yet haphazard rise to infamy, yet her process deserves great appreciation and study. I strongly believe that these books need to be sold and read in tandem, with the chronology of publication clearly defined. Only then can the world understand fully the complexities of the South and the genius of those who tried to capture its inhuman darkness with self-conscious grace. I highly recommend these two books, and very likely will return to them myself one day.

©2018 E.T.